the stories
the kitchen
the market
the proof (party pics!)
the food porn
the recipes
the about
the drop me a line part
the resources
the full list
jewelry alchemy

soupapalooza!

the stories
the kitchen
the market
the proof (party pics!)
the food porn
the recipes
the about
the drop me a line part
the resources
the full list
jewelry alchemy

blog from the hiatus: cooling off is for p***ies (piggies, silly!)

It’s true. It has been two weeks since my last real soupapolooza! event, though soup does go on regardless if I am cooking it on Sunday or not. I’m still here, still eating and still planning our next soupventure, which will be exactly one week from Sunday. I’ve been honoring my summer commitments and being, well, a pig in s**t.

In the meantime, I’m posting some ancillary recipes from the previous weeks just to make sure you have something to do while hiding in the AC. Check back in a bit and see what goodies (food? bad/ very good dating stories?) await.

Soup on!

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PostedJuly 13, 2010
Authormelissa mcclure
Categoriesgear and miscellany
Tagsno recipe, pool envy, haitus, lazy blogger, summer!
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happy independence day!: in honor of american stubbornness I hereby let someone else cook today

The photo at the beginning of this post is a picture of a crab, or, more accurately, a symbol of my mood. Well, maybe that’s a bit of an exaggeration; I’m just not really a “holiday” person in general and I do my best to sleep through as many of them as possible. But, you know, I should totally be able to rally behind the idea of giving the middle finger to “The Man” (in this instance, King George) and stuffing one’s gullet full of meat before getting drunk and watching pyromaniacs blow shit up. I mean those were the integral ingredients to every party I attended from 1986-1993. What’s not to love?

Actually, I think I posted the crab picture because, as I stood in line last Sunday at the J & P West Coast Seafood stall at the Hollywood Farmer’s Market, the poor, delicious dead thing seemed to be calling my name. I struggled to find a way to change my soup plans from mussels to crab, but thought better of being so impulsive when I realized I had already bought the ingredients for my supporting courses to the mussel and fennel bisque. I stick to a plan once a plan is in place (maybe that’s why my personal life is such a mess?). And I also think I’m holding out to do a crazy seafood grill party (grillapolooza!) sometime in August out on my sadly underutilized urban patio. I imagine me and a Weber grill and oysters and crab and Bloody Marys and tons of beer. Maybe we could throw some meat in there, too, in honor of the keeper of the family grill secrets, my dad. 

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PostedJuly 4, 2010
Authormelissa mcclure
Categoriesgear and miscellany
TagsTexas BBQ, sometimes I'm a real asshole, no recipe, college party, crabby, let someone else cook for a change, casey T, independence day, crab, july 4
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no pantry left behind: what Chef Kenobi says you need

​So the Bossy Blonde is officially staying in the Harbor of Sags for the rest of the season (doesn’t that sound just so darlingly patrician?) while I am basically collecting fruit flies and furiously making labels here in my loft. I’d like to make a lame comment about the apparent lack of fairness in the situation, but  since I’m going to haul myself out there to visit her fabulousness anyway, I shouldn’t really complain. And it’s not like we don’t have a million email conversations a day. In fact, she forwarded me a very enlightening email from Chef Kenobi just the other day, but more on that in a few...

In an attempt to cleanse the old palate from the last few posts, I thought I might write something that is actually useful in the kitchen, something that is not the ramblings of a girl in the midst of some boredom-induced psychotic break. So here it is. The first official posting of “No Pantry Left Behind.” 

One of my favorite parts of many of my cook books is the little section where the chef or the author of the book talks about their favorite tools or what basic pantry supplies you should have on hand. Being a novice cook, I have found these sections to be invaluable; one of the most challenging aspects of learning to cook has been making sure I have everything I need at any given time. It has been a daunting learning curve-- if you don’t have certain staples on hand you can never really learn how to improvise in the kitchen or just whip something up for yourself (or for your friends when they stop by unexpectedly). I have gleaned a tremendous amount from these pages-- about what I need to have on hand and how to plan out the most effective and least wasteful use of the perishables I buy at the farmer’s market every week. 

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PostedJune 11, 2010
Authormelissa mcclure
Categoriesgear and miscellany
Tagspantry, no pantry left behind, Chef Kenobi, compulsive labelmaking is a mental disorder, vinegar, staples, no recipe, gear, surfas, fantes, sur la table, salt, Bossy
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frijoles a la charra: the one where you’re wearing a tutu in your stress dreams...

​This is totally off-topic. I mean totally and completely. I had an amazing bowl of bean soup at MomAlone in Clear Lake on Sunday, but that’s about the only thread that connects this post to the regularly scheduled ramblings of this blog. This last weekend I went home.

According to my very academic, very scientific research on the subject (asking a couple of people I know), many people have the classic stress dream on occasion. You know the one-- the one where you show up for your final exam and you realize that you haven’t attended a single class during the semester and panic ensues? Well, maybe because this was a pretty common occurrence for me during those four amazing booze-soaked years in college, I have a completely different stress dream altogether.

In my stress dream I am at the 1894 Opera House in Galveston, Texas and I step out onto a darkened stage only to be illuminated by a single spotlight right at the moment I remember that I’m supposed to be dancing my solo and I haven’t bothered to learn the dance. It’s seriously the most terrifying thing I can imagine apart from the side-eye my mom gave me as a kid when I did something truly offensive like say the word “bitchin’” or wear my hair slicked back like a Robert Palmer girl while wearing a gray flannel suit (the latter of which prompted her to ask me if I was feeling confused about my sexuality). My particular stress dream is probably scary and anxiety-provoking for me because it was my actuality as a kid; I took dance lessons for fourteen years, performed on that very stage time and again and I never did learn my solo until minutes before performing it to a house of almost a thousand people.

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PostedMay 25, 2010
Authormelissa mcclure
Categoriesgear and miscellany
Tagsstage fright, Tiny Dancer, texmex, Texas, teenaged nightmares, stress dreams, no recipe
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goldsmith, sometime costume designer and badass cat owner. 

goldsmith, sometime costume designer and badass cat owner. 

  • dessert (1)
  • party planning (1)
  • libations (2)
  • stocks and broths (2)
  • vegan (5)
  • breakfast (6)
  • desserts & sweet treats (9)
  • quick pics! (9)
  • appetizers and snacks (10)
  • salad (10)
  • positively piggy (11)
  • gear and miscellany (15)
  • vegetarian (33)
  • soup (36)

Why? Because soup is cheap, delicious and easy. Kind of like me.

a weekly attempt to eat well and to savor life. or to see how much food I can get on my clothes.

 copyright © 2009-2015 soupapalooza! and melissa mcclure. all rights reserved.